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Lourdes: Catholic Pilgrimage Site

Discover how the visions of a teenage girl from Lourdes, France, inspired one of the holiest Catholic pilgrimage sites in this media gallery from Sacred Journeys with Bruce Feiler. Since 1858, when a 14-year-old peasant named Bernadette Soubirous proclaimed she had had 18 encounters with the Virgin Mary, Lourdes has become one of the most visited sites by Catholics in the world. Lourdes has a special appeal for the fragile and the weak, including wounded military personnel. It attracts more than 5 million pilgrims a year, many of whom seek to be cured of afflictions. This resource is part of the Sacred Journeys with Bruce Feiler Collection.

On February 11, 1858, in the French village of Lourdes, a 14-year-old girl named Bernadette Soubirous claimed to have seen a vision in a grotto, or cave, of an unidentified woman dressed in white with a blue belt around her waist. After a succession of visits, the apparition eventually introduced herself to Bernadette as the Immaculate Conception—another name for the Virgin Mary. Among other revelations, Mary instructed Bernadette to drink spring water from the grotto, to tell the priests to build a chapel at the site, and to have people visit the site in procession.

While the local townspeople were not sure whether to believe Bernadette, a large number of people began to follow her on her daily journey to the grotto. Soon, pilgrims began coming to Lourdes from far away. They were attracted by stories of apparitions and miraculous healings that occurred when infirm people bathed in the spring water. After four years of skepticism, the Roman Catholic Church validated Bernadette’s claims that she had seen the mother of Jesus.

The timing of both the visions and the validation are important to consider. France was still recovering from the effects of its revolution 70 years earlier and the reign of terror that had ensued. With the gradual rise of industrialization, a working class, a representative government, and “enlightened” intellectualism, the status of the Catholic Church in France had fallen. Prominent scholars openly attacked the Christian faith, one stating that the gospel writers invented persons and miracles and another suggesting that Jesus himself was a myth. Moreover, the 1859 publication of Charles Darwin’s The Origin of the Species reinforced the idea that everything, including the origins of life detailed in the book of Genesis, could be explained by natural causes.

By the mid-19th century, secularism was nearing its height. With a widespread loss of faith, the “re-Catholicism” of France would prove to be a long and painful process. Yet as the Church tried to reconnect with the people, it began to view Mary, the subject of the Lourdes’s apparition, and other apparitions of the era, as the perfect vehicle. And Bernadette was a sympathetic figure, the ideal recipient of the gift of the apparition. While most notable religious revelations before then had been reported by men, Mary’s appearance to Bernadette seemed fitting, since the Biblical Mary was herself young and vulnerable at the time she was visited by the angel Gabriel and told she was pregnant with the son of God.

The “Marian” visions, at Lourdes and elsewhere, helped set the foundation for a spectacular recovery in the Catholic Church. The revival was primarily a female phenomenon. Even though women were still not allowed to play primary roles in the Catholic Church, they showed greater allegiance than did men to the Church. Religious orders organized to venerate Mary and serve the needs of the uneducated, the sick, and the hungry. In 1789, women constituted one-third of all secular and regular clergy. By the turn of the 20th century, this ratio had grown to nearly three-fifths.

Use this map to locate the sites of six of the world’s great pilgrimages as featured in Sacred Journeys with Bruce Feiler. The sites and their respective religious traditions are: Shikoku, Japan (Buddhism); Lourdes, France (Christianity); Allahabad, India (Hinduism); Mecca, Saudi Arabia (Islam); Jerusalem, Israel (Judaism); and Osogbo, Nigeria (Yoruba).

Here are suggested ways to engage students with this video and with activities related to this topic.

Doing research projects—individual: Host Bruce Feiler states, “At first, no one believed Bernadette, including the local priest.” Have students consider a time in their own life when no one believed what they considered to be true. Did others’ opinions make them doubt their own experience or reinforce it? Did they shrink back or become bolder? Did their age or social status contribute to their skepticism? Did others eventually come around to believing them? What makes something true? Have students answer these questions in essay form, with much attention to detail. They should be prepared to share their essay with the class.

Doing an individual and small-group activity: “That is the vision that Lourdes has; the fragile, the weak are the most important people.” Ask students to write down responses to the following:

How have you seen this play out in your own life (or not)?

What did Jesus mean when he said that “the last shall be first and the first shall be last”?

Does the philosophy of capitalism or social Darwinism endorse such a claim? Do other economic systems make this claim?

Name some historical figures who were both fragile/weak and important.

After they finish, have students form small groups and, using their answers to the questions above, write a one-act play that demonstrates what Jesus may have meant by the words “the last shall be first and the first shall be last.”

Doing research projects—individual: “Pilgrimages often arise in places where humans encounter the Divine.” First, have students reflect on the following questions:

Do humans actually do this, or are their encounters the result of an overactive imagination?

What is meant by “divine,” anyway?

Do we need such encounters to actually believe in God? Can we be good without believing in God?

Did God create us, or did we create God?

Then, have students use modeling clay to sculpt the God of their early childhood and the God of their present-day beliefs. If God is not a part of their present-day experience, have them use the clay to depict either the absence of God or a representation of what is good. Tell students to be prepared to share their images with the class.

Doing research projects—individual: How was the establishment of Lourdes as a place of pilgrimage influenced by the Catholic Church? Research the history of the other locations mentioned in the video where visitations by Mary were reported. How did the sociopolitical role of the Church lead to the establishment of these more modern pilgrimage centers?

Here are suggested ways to engage students with the Pilgrimage Locations Map located in the For Students section:

Doing a class or small-group activity: Pilgrimages are journeys to sacred places that followers of a religion make as an act of devotion. In some cases, the sites are located in major cities, and the journeys are made alongside masses of other people. In other cases, the sites are in remote settings, and the journeys are taken individually. Ask students:

Why do you think this is?

How might the location or setting of a pilgrimage, and the group or solo nature of it, reflect aspects of the religion to which it’s related?

Address a few ideas in discussion with the class. Then, have students watch the videos in the Sacred Journeys with Bruce Feiler Collection to learn more about pilgrimages of six specific religious traditions: Buddhism, Christianity (specifically, Catholicism), Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, and the Yoruba faith. After watching the videos, revisit the questions and have students expand on the earlier discussion either as a class or in small groups.

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